Hasta La Gadget!

Sad news for global freeloaders travellers looking to keep up with Gmail and Twitter on their Amazon e-reader. The online book seller has started closing in on excessive free web browsing, policing a 50MB data limit on its keyboard Kindle iterations. According to users on MobileRead, you’ll still be able to browse Amazon’s Kindle store and Wikipedia, but anything beyond that gets locked down. After some further investigation, it looks like Amazon added a provision outlining the data limits on its site, dated around July 1st. It stipulating that users “may be limited to 50MB of browsing over 3G per month.” The data cap only applies to older Kindle versions, including the Kindle Keyboard and Kindle DX. If you’ve got Amazon’s latest e-reader hardware, then you’re not missing anything — the free web browsing option was sidestepped on the likes of the Kindle Touch.

Filed under: Internet

Amazon puts 50MB limit on 3G Kindle’s ‘free’ experimental browser originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 24 Jul 2012 10:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There’s a Reuters report out there this morning saying there will be “five or six” new Kindle Fire models, according Demos Parneros, president of U.S. Retail for Staples. That doesn’t mean what you think it means, exactly. More »

Amazon is readying as many as six new tablet variants according to retailer Staples, with a 10-inch model confirmed among the line-up. Five or six SKUs are in the pipeline, Retail president Demos Parneros at Staples told Reuters, with a range of sizes on offer as Amazon attempts to further milk the digital content market for music, video, ebook and app sales.

It’s worth noting that six new SKUs wouldn’t necessarily mean six completely different tablets. Each SKU would relate to a single configuration: so, if Amazon had 16GB, 32GB and 64GB versions of a single Kindle Fire 10-inch model, for instance, each of those variants would have a different SKU code. Models that are WiFi-only or that include WiFi + 3G/4G would also bear different SKUs.

Currently, Amazon offers a single Kindle Fire variant, with 8GB of internal storage and no 3G/4G cellular data connection, and a 7-inch touchscreen. That model is expected to be updated in the face of Google’s own Nexus 7, while a larger 10-inch version is also much-rumored, more directly challenging Apple’s 9.7-inch iPad.

The boosted range is part of an overall strategy to “broaden its offering of devices beyond e-readers and the Kindle Fire tablet” insiders claim. That could well be related to a reported swelling of staff at Amazon’s Lab126, the same development center that developed the original Kindle Fire; recent job listings at Lab126 have sought engineers with experience working with carrier certification and smartphone technology.

Amazon declined to comment on Parneros’ comments, though it’s tricky to decide whether the retailer might be frustrated at having its plans outed early, or keen to steal attention from the Nexus 7. Google has been forced to freeze orders of the 16GB variant of the Nexus 7 because of greater-than-expected demand.

Amazon readying 5-6 new tablets says Staples exec is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Amazon is boosting its R&D work into digital media, including “interactive digital services” for consoles, smart TV, tablets and other mobile devices, with a new Digital Media Innovation Hub opening in the UK. The new 47,000 sq. ft. center in Central London will pull together software engineers, UI experts and graphic designers, who will likely be responsible for not only bringing Amazon’s site up to date, but for developing the next-gen Kindle Fire tablet interface and software for the much-rumored Kindle smartphone.

Amazon is calling on its staff resources from streaming rental firm LOVFiLM as well as Pushbutton, its 2011 acquisition developing digital media interfaces for new platforms. Pushbutton is already responsible for the LOVEFiLM interfaces on the iPad, PS3 and Xbox 360.

The design and development teams from both companies will be brought together at the new London hub, working on digital media projects for the global market. Amazon says their goals will be “the creation of interactive digital services for TVs, game consoles, smartphones and PCs; the development of the digital media experience on Amazon websites around the world; and the building of services and APIs that power that digital media experience.”

Digital media is the cornerstone of Amazon’s Kindle range, all the devices of which are primarily intended to encourage user to buy or rent more content. The low price of the Kindle Fire, for instance, is a loss-leader of sorts, with Amazon trading the low upfront margin on the hardware itself for the promise of greater media sales along the line.

That same strategy is tipped to be at the heart of Amazon’s upcoming smartphone. The handset would be Android-based but heavily reskinned, ousting Google’s own content stores in favor of Amazon’s own media and app distribution.

Amazon Digital Media Innovation Hub will push next-gen content delivery is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Amazon has signed a deal with Warner Brothers Television that will see the online retailer gaining access to televisions shows such as Fringe, The West Wing, and Alcatraz for its Prime Instant Video service. Anyone who subscribes to Amazon Prime gains access to on-demand movies and TV shows that can be accessed via a multitude of devices, and now Warner’s TV catalogue will be added to the list of available content.

Amazon says that Fringe and The West Wing will be available this summer exclusively on Prime Instant Video, a subtle dig, perhaps, at Netflix and other streaming services. Customers will be able to watch video on a wide variety of devices like the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Roku streamers, plus various tablets. As of writing, Prime Instant Video has around 18,000 movies and TVs ready to stream.

The popular online retailer has been ramping up its content deal as of late. Earlier in the year it added shows from The Discovery Channel and Animal Planet, plus movies from Magnolia Pictures. The company is also hoping to produce original content for Prime Instant Video, a similar strategy to Netflix and Hulu. Amazon began accepting pitches for shows back in May, with successful writers getting a chance to earn $10,000 if the company options the idea.

Amazon Prime Instant Video adds Warner TV shows is written by Ben Kersey & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.